Thursday 1 August 2013

Dropzone Commander Card Terrain with 6mm Minis

This is for "Mr Average" from TMP.

I initially thought "6mm with 10mm buildings?"
Small scale minis with big buildings (especially big windows and doorways) = stupid, right?

But I plunked down some models on terrain..... and was surprised how well the models fit with the roads....

The 6mm vehicles fit the road markings really well. Note the thin cardboard base tiles curling up which I complained about in my review.

But what about the doors and windows etc? They are usually the biggest give-away for out-of-scale stuff.
You could drive a tank through that door.... literally...

The infantry are dwarfed by the air conditioning ducts...

This angle isn't too bad, although it IS a generously sized doorway...

This show illustrates how the 6mm fits well with the roads, but poorly with the buildings....

Verdict
Ultimately it's up to you. Whilst the roads are a good fit, the base tiles are the worst part of the DzC cardboard set.  I personally am not a fan of having huge doorways you could drive a tank through, and it's not like there isn't a plethora of affordable 6mm terrain options.  A while back I bought (and reviewed) some 6mm terrain from Brigade Model: buildings were only $1.50-$2 each. 
To be honest, 6mm is the one scale I could never be bothered scratch-building terrain for as it's so cheap and easy....

While you COULD certainly use it for 6mm if you weren't fussy - why bother? It's not like 6mm terrain costs that much anyway....

5 comments:

  1. I was wondering, for the base tiles, would it be possible to run them through a laminator?
    It would solve the problem of the edges curling up and protect your tiles in one go.

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    Replies
    1. The laminating process does not eliminate curving in the card, and the process itself leaves clear plastic "edges" that extend 2-3mm beyond the card itself - that means the base tiles would always be a few mm apart i.e. "gaps" between tiles.

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  2. Thanks for the comparison! personally the big doors don't bother me, as I'm inclined to feel like epic sized entries scale off pretty well in urban settings. large buildings can have ten foot doors or fifteen foot ceilings. it's the roads I was worried about. But as you say, it's rather cheap either way to get buildings at 6mm scale. I just like the context of the set. it feels whole, instead of my usual "city popping out of verdant green landscape."

    --M

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In that case, go for it. There's no scale police around here. I know what you mean about "city popping up in the middle of green table" - an entire city board makes more sense unless it is a rather small hamlet/village....

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  3. The buildings are also available as free downloadable files from the Hawk Wargames site (link at the bottom of the Scenery page) which would allow you to scale them before printing them out.

    ReplyDelete